


Further Reflection

by Rosella_Burgundy



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Death Elements, F/M, Heartbreak, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Mirror magic, Reflection, The Slytherin Cabal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-18
Updated: 2019-03-18
Packaged: 2019-11-23 07:42:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18149051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosella_Burgundy/pseuds/Rosella_Burgundy
Summary: While Luna walks to her favourite river bend, a distant call captures her attention. Discovering who's hidden in the grasslands will take her on an emotional journey of love and freedom.





	Further Reflection

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [DBQ2019Round1](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/DBQ2019Round1) collection. 



> Written for Death by Quill - Round 1, hosted by the Slytherin Cabal.
> 
> Awards: Third place in this round, Admin's Choice Award - Diane.
> 
> Thank you! I have no other words.
> 
> My deepest gratitude goes to my alpha/beta. Without her, I wouldn't be proud of this work. Finally, I can thank you properly and shout your name: I_WAS_BOTWP  
> you are the star of this fandom! THANK YOU isn't enough.
> 
> JK Rowling owns Harry Potter. This is just a work of fanfiction.

* * *

 

 

As Luna wandered through the moor, the soil felt soft under the soles of her bare feet. With a smile, she tucked a dog rose behind her ear, the velvety petals tickling her skin.

Bottom Bridge was far behind her. Before her, hills gently rolled. The burbling waters of the stream split the meadow into two halves that expanded until they met the horizon.

Luna followed the creek as it slithered across the earth, her hands caressing the tall stems of the grassland, her eyes drinking in the fields, dotted with vermilion and golden hues of the summer blooms. With a contented sigh, she brushed the trumpet crown of a daffodil while the sweet, floral scent of heather delighted her nose.

The bucolic landscape radiated a sense of peace that travelled within her veins and mingled with her magical core. She felt serene, light like the pollen dancing in the wind.

Before she could reach her favourite river bend where the Plimpies thrived in abundance, the summer breeze carried a distant call to her. Squinting her eyes in the sun, she searched the wold, but nobody was there.

“Hello?” the voice cried again, the sound muffled by the wind and the running water.

Luna studied the moving stream, recoiling as if the water itself had been whispering.

“Can somebody hear me?” came the desperate lament of whomever was hiding in the prairie.

Rationally, she knew that in this time of war she should recant her steps and head back home to avoid falling into a trap. She was already taking a chance being alone in the open, but that distressed, ethereal voice tugged at the strings of her soul, drawing her forth.

Her feet moved west, dragging her farther into the meadow. The vegetation grew thicker, trapping the hem of her dress in its tiny thorns, and her breath grew shorter as she struggled to find a way through. Heart thundering in her eardrums, she pushed forward until the thicket opened up to reveal a natural pool.

Bewildered, she drank in the way the sun’s rays hit the placid waters, breaking in a myriad of quivering fragments on the reflective surface. The lake was crystal clear, so that she could distinguish each of the grey pebbles that lay at the bottom.

“ _Homenum Revelio_ ,” she whispered, wielding her wand in a flourishing motion. Nobody but a lonely frog on a lilypad was there. Even the wind had dissolved, the air suddenly immobile.

“Thank Salazar! Can you see me?” The hopeful timbre renewed the mad sprinting of her heart, her chest heaving in response.

Now that she was close, she could discern that the low eager voice belonged to a male, but there was no man to be seen. It seemed to come from the pool itself.

Against good sense, Luna followed the overpowering pull straight to the water.

As she dipped her toes in at the edge of the pool, patches of waterlilies danced and swayed. She leaned over, the long line of her neck stretching to better see. Eyes fixed on the water, she observed how her reflection broke in weirdly shaped blocks and shifted like an abstract painting. When the water settled, she stared at her heart-shaped face illuminated by the sunshine.

The voice was silent while she studied her mirrored image. Two braided strands of hair above her ears held back the rest, far from her eyes. Her reflection somewhat calmed her frightened heart.

“Hi…” the presence greeted, his voice between wonder and uncertainty.

Startled, she hopped back, her bare feet meeting the prickly grass once more. A treacherous root tripped her, and she fell backwards, her buttocks cruelly hitting the ground.

Wincing from the pain, she moaned. But the need to unravel that mystery was stronger. She crawled back to the pool, her mirrored image staring at her anew. Pursing her lips together, she focused on the water surface. Slowly, like a magical painting seeping through the texture of canvas, a face appeared. The young man grinned when her mouth opened in surprise at the sight of him, one corner of his lips arching higher than the other.

He had no solid form, as though his presence were a mere reflection on a mirror. The water beneath him and the rocky bottom of the pool remained unmoved and empty as he rose a hand in greeting.

“You’re Luna Lovegood! Ravenclaw,” he stated, a smile still playing on his lips.

Although the sight was uncanny, Luna relaxed her limbs, opening the hand that had balled on her chest in a tight fist. She could sense no danger in his emerald eyes. “I can't say I know your name. Sorry.”

“Theodore Nott,” he introduced himself, raking a hand through his sandy hair.

Canting her head to the side, Luna reached out and grazed the surface next to Theo. The water vibrated, circles expanding from her finger, creating crescent dips and crests. Theo lifted his own hand, a long elegant finger meeting her own. She didn't feel the soft touch of a pad; a melancholic pout bunched his lips.

“Is this a two-way mirror? Where are you?” she asked when his image didn't change, his features following the water movement so that his face remained unperturbed.

It was as though Theo had been waiting for someone to talk to for a long time. He took a deep breath and unleashed a stream of words onto her.

He didn't precisely know where he was. He was trapped in an evanescent cage filled with a swirling mist. He had no idea how long he had been there, but who put him there was a certainty. His father had punished him for refusing the Dark Mark, imprisoning him in that timeless holding cell.

Folding her legs beneath her, Luna shifted on the grass, empathy darkening her thoughts. With a growing weight in her heart, she hung on each and every word, a sense of anxiety constricting her chest. Despite her internal agitation, Luna was a good listener and knew how to ease people's worries by digging up some random detail about a magical creature, or two.

“I forgot my basket for the Plimpies…” she blurted out when she thought that Theo's monologue was done.

At first, he flinched, studying her as though she were a rare albino dragon. Soon, though, his face softened, and a wide grin reached his big ears, giving him an adorable boyish charm.

“Those foul things infested my mom’s favourite pond, ruining all her water lilies while hunting for snails.” Theo shifted on the unperturbed surface, seemingly sitting down in his solitary confinement, although Luna could not see what surrounded him.

“Gurdyroots ward them off. The smell upsets them.” She paused to brush a wild lock behind her ear. The wind had picked up again, tiny ripples forming on the surface of the water.  Drinking in his face, she marvelled at the uncanny flawlessness of it compared to the imperfection of the surface. His sharp jawline complemented his long nose and generous lips perfectly. She swallowed. “Another way to get rid of those pests is to tie their legs in a knot and let them float away. Although in a pond, there'd be nowhere to drift to…”

Luna played with the dog rose tucked behind her ear, lost in her thought for a brief moment until Theo laughed - deep, loud and hearty laughter. Tears of mirth pooled at the corners of his eyes where thin wrinkles had sprung to life.

Barely containing a laugh of her own, Luna smirked at him. Deep in her chest, something soared and sparked to life because she knew that she had just created a carefree moment for someone who was in a dire situation.

When the sun had almost set, painting the meadow with orange pastels and setting fire to the pool water that reflected its dying rays like floating embers, it found Luna still there. She left only after eagerly promising Theo, “I’ve heard of mirror traps before - I need to find the correct books. I believe there’s a way out - it will just take a little research.”

 

* * *

 

It was colourless inside his prison, only dark hues casting shades of twilight on his world. Surrounded by grey fog, Theo spent his time staring at his own reflection that sometimes generated on random whirls of the mist. He could vaguely recall the beginning of his exile when he still had the strength to feel something. In time, a sense of resignation had taken over his mind, and he simply existed there like a drifter at sea, waiting for a wave to pull him under, for there was no land or salvation.

His heart felt like the fragile fall leaves, barely hanging on for their lives to their twig while the tempest unleashed its wind upon them. His past was a blur while his tomorrow only seemed to bear insanity.

Seldomly, in lieu of his mirrored image, he perceived an isle of hope in the ever expanding fog. The storm calmed while Luna’s breathtaking, blue eyes fought their way through the mists. In those rare moments, his life was colourful, as though she were a skilful painter, and he the blank canvas.

He let himself yearn for her with every particle of his being, lest he forgot about her all over again.

How he could long for someone he had never truly met, he didn't know. He had never buried his nose in her fair locks, but he missed her floral scent. He had never laid hands on her porcelain skin, and yet, he had the mad need to stroke those perfect lines. He had never tasted those plump lips, but for some reason, he could feel the phantom of their soft touch on him, and he craved it. The need for her burned in his veins as his heart pumped blood with a fast, powerful beat.

He felt lost, as he knew that there was no way to reach out to her. He was astray in barren lands - alone, but at least he felt something.

Pacing his cage, he hung on to the image of her. Gasping for air and wondering if there was a way out. He knew he had asked her to help him. And he vaguely recalled staring at her while she researched a way to free him, laying down on her belly, feet wiggling up in the air.

“Theo?” her musical voice killed the silence that was deafening him.

She was back. She was real.

When she was with him, he could distinguish every hue that surrounded her. She was glorious, clad in a blue short dress, nearly the same colour as the serene sky above her. Her eyes shone like sapphire gems, lighting up his heart.

The meadow was calm, no wind to disturb the grass and blooms. The lily pads in his pool were placidly floating in the water.

“Gorgeous…” The confession escaped his mouth while warmth crept up his neck. He gave her a sheepish grin, and Luna returned a toothy smile.

“It's a lovely summer day,” she conceded as if she didn't grasp the meaning of the word he had blurted out, although her cheeks were as rosy as her lips. Luna sat on the grass, her golden locks bobbing around while the butterbeer cork necklace bounced on her chest.

He remembered the day he saw her wearing it for the first time. It had been a rainy day, beads of water hopping on the pond’s surface and trailing down her neck. He was almost sure that it had been the same day they talked about their departed mothers. Or was it when they discussed Thestral sleeping habits? He couldn't be certain.

There were minuscule droplets on her skin today as well, but they were made of sweat instead of rain. Theo wondered whether they would taste salty or sweet, were he to lick them off her skin.

He sighed, heart thundering in his chest. “Are you hot?” He regretted asking such an idiotic question the second it left his lips. Of course, she was; the summer sun was smouldering like the looks he kept darting at her cleavage.

Mouth watering, he drank in her form as she lay in the sun before him. He could not recall the last time he had felt thirsty. Her breasts were round and small, nipples pebbling under the fabric. How he wished Luna would spring her petite frame into the pool. He could imagine her luscious, long legs backing up for a running start to him. He would whisper to her ear to close her eyes and pretend he were the water, and skim her skin with his insubstantial touch. It would be agony and ecstasy.

When he finally let his eyes wander to hers, his heart sank deep into the fog. Her normally bright eyes were dull with longing, sadness spreading miserably on her face while she pulled her legs to her chest.

Jaw clenched and fists balled at his sides, he witnessed her breaking down. Her tears were his own. He loathed himself for doing this to her. He was a damned one, and she should not be doing harm to herself by stubbornly coming back for him over and over in a cursed circle of pain. He wished he had the courage to shout at her to leave and never come back, but he was too selfish.

If Luna and Theo had something in common, it was the ability to diffuse tension. Imposing some composure to his tense body, he relaxed his jaw. “I know summer is almost over, but I'll be here when you come home from Hogwarts for Christmas. Although, I might be frozen over until you find a way to free me.” He let a smirk pull a corner of his lips upward.

Sniffling away the last of her tears, she fixed her azure gaze on him, her limbs as still as marble, but he could see the turmoil lurking underneath the gold flakes of her irises, like covered embers.

“I'm so sorry you had to die.” The simple sincerity of her timbre punched him in the stomach with unexpected violence. He stumbled backwards, eyebrows pinched together. His whole body began shivering as his nerves knotted in hurtful bundles.

“No. My father trapped me here in June for refusing to join Voldemort.” His voice was a trembling whisper as he rejected her claim.

She shook her head. “We do this every time, Theo. It's been three years.”

“What?” His hands found his hair, pulling it until his scalp hurt as he tried to make sense of her words.

New tears of despair appeared at the corner of her eyes. “The war has been over for two years now. I've met you here since the summer of 1997. You forget every time. You just remember-”

“You.” He finished for her as he acknowledged that time to him was as ephemeral as his misty cell. She nodded, wiping her cheeks.

His legs felt as ethereal as the fog surrounding him; he had to sit down. His hands left his hair, scraping down his cheeks.

Muddled memories began spiralling in his mind. His father stared at him with disgust while aiming a wand at his chest. Shouting and a green light followed, then nothing but dull grey until Luna found him. The truth shattered his heart, shards of it digging their way within his ribcage.

“Have you always known?” he hissed, anger marring his words.

The hurt in her eyes when she answered slightly softened his blazing ire. “Not right away. Researching a way to get you out, I found out that souls sometimes get trapped into reflective surfaces. After the war, Nott Manor was searched by the Aurors.” She swallowed something thick as she finished. “You're there, buried on the grounds.”

“Fuck.” Theo could barely speak, his mouth was as dry as old parchment.

“I'm so sorry,” she repeated with a low whimper.

“What am I then? I can feel when you are here. I can see, hear, touch myself!” Shouting did little to calm his racing heart. He loathed himself for yelling at her.

“You are a fragment of your soul. Just a reflection of it, trapped in a place that was familiar to you.” A question hung between them as she waited for him to think of a reason why his spirit chose that specific natural pool.

More recollections flooded back. “If we are in the meadow near the village of Ottery St Catchpole, then this is the pool my mother used to take me to as a child. There used to be a fairy tree on a small centre island before my father destroyed it to spite her. The manor is a couple of kilometres east of here.” He could not recognize his voice as it came out flat and monotone.

“Have you told me before?”

He couldn't refrain from glowering when she attempted to deny it. “I didn't want to hurt you for no reason, so I kept it from you until I found a way to release your soul.”

Theo considered how painful it had been for her to lie to him. He could see it in her eyes, in the way her head canted downward.

Drinking in the beautiful soul before him, Theo reflected. He comprehended why he had always felt broken. The rest of his soul had been calling for him, hidden behind a gate of shadows. When his fate settled inside him, it broke him, but he knew he had to move on, to stop poisoning her heart. He was nothing but dread and weary days, grief and endless mourning. She deserved more.

Luna had been his only light along that lost, dark road; perhaps, it was time to let her shine on someone more worthy of her.

 

* * *

 

The day had come.

Everything was ready when she reached the pond at twilight. They had already said their parting words, as lingering on hurtful goodbyes before the ritual would be heart-shattering.

Theo was waiting for her with an expectant smile. The amity in his features somewhat eased her agony. He looked in peace as though he had finally accepted his fate.

Kneeling down on the grass, Luna’s face hovered over the water. Heart racing, she let her hand ghost over the surface.

Theo bit his lower lip; she feared his resolution faded momentarily as he skimmed his shadowy palm on hers.

She cringed when she didn't feel the touch of his skin. Drifting in a pool of despair, Luna stared into his eyes, emerald gems reflecting the dying rays of the sun. Her other hand was clasping the same gem, her knuckles whitening and her palm sore.

Emerald was Theo's birthstone, and it was vital for the spell.

Retracting his hand, Theo nodded with an almost imperceptible movement.

It was time.

Luna pulled herself up on weak legs, her eyes never leaving Theo. She felt numb as she released the stone to hover before her.

It took all her power to close her eyes, Theo's crooked smirk the last thing she saw.

After taking a deep breath and relaxing her tingling muscles, she pointed her wand onto her right palm, the wood digging in her flesh. She welcomed the pain as she slashed her skin as though it could soothe her bleeding heart.

A blinding light hit her closed eyelids as she began channelling all her magic for the spell.

Words flowed out of her, clawing their way up her throat. She felt the air around her shift and thin. Torn by the need to see him again, Luna opened her eyes.

The gem, covered in blood, was floating above the pool. A thick fog was slithering out of the water’s surface. At first, it expanded, a few red rays piercing through it. Then it twirled and danced before her, finally condensing in a human form.

Luna was mesmerized by Theo's beauty as he walked towards her on the water, his soul in search of a vessel to carry it from this plane of existence to the other side.

She had to extend her neck to look into his misty eyes. Huge pearls of sorrow spilt from her eyes as he gave her a last longing smile and leaned towards her.

His lips ghosted over hers for a brief moment, sending shivers across her skin. Theo’s features vanished into vapour as his soul twisted into a long pearlescent thread that wrapped around her wrist, spiralling upward to her hand and weaving through her fingers. The smokey filament seeped through the cut in her hand.

She felt her own soul shivering as he dwelt within her. Her mind was in stasis, her heart still. Whispered words mingled with the wind. “I love you…”

Theo's spirit dissipated away, abandoning her own soul in a wreck of a thousand pieces.

 

                     

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. Please let me know your thoughts on this story.
> 
> Early on, I left a little clue regarding Theo's fate. To find the pond, Luna goes west. I need to give credit to James Joyce for this image. In the last paragraph of "The Dead" from his Dubliners collection, during Gabriel's epiphany, Joyce describes death as a journey westward.  
> Going west symbolizes dying in the English culture. Also, the sun sets and "dies" in the west.


End file.
